title: Psychology of time awareness.
abstract: Mind transforms the continuance of physical space-time into moments (the absolute Now) and blends these moments into an apparent continuity through an overlapping of unfolding capsules. The flow of psychological time is an illusion based on the rapid replacement of these capsules. Each mind computes the measure of time passing and duration from the decay of the surface present in relation to a core of past events. As each new surface is generated, that surface, the rim of the immediate past, recedes in the wake of rising contents. This recession, an uncovering of phases latent in the original traversal, exposes layers in the past forming the content of the immediate past moment. The surge of the microgeny to a surface that dissolves the instant it appears, the priority of the Self in the unfolding sequence, the feeling of agency, create a Self in a state of becoming, a Self that travels in time like the crest of a wave, always in pursuit of a future just beyond the grasp of the present.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, New York University Medical Center.
authors.forename: J W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Brown
mesh_terms: D001143:Arousal; D001364:Awareness; D004325:Dreams; D006801:Humans; D011939:Mental Recall; D010469:Perceptual Distortion; D013998:Time Perception